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D Shivakumar has resigned as the chairman and CEO of PepsiCo India, nearly four years after taking up the role at the local unit of the US beverages and snacks giant.

Shivakumar had joined PepsiCo in 2013 after leaving telecom handset maker Nokia.

He will join cement-to-telecom conglomerate Aditya Birla Group as its group executive president in January next year, and will report to group chairman Kumar Mangalam Birla.

PepsiCo confirmed the development and appointed Ahmed El Sheikh, who has been leading the company’s Egypt and Jordan business, as Shivakumar’s successor.

Sheikh will assume his new role on 1 November. He will be the first non-Indian CEO at PepsiCo India.

Sanjeev Chadha, chief executive at PepsiCo’s Asia, Middle East and Africa business, said that Shivakumar led the transformation journey for the company. “He has been a key driver for portfolio transformation, helped develop our nutrition business and deepened consumer engagement with our flagship brands,” Chadha said.

Shivakumar, an alumnus of IIM Calcutta, had earlier worked at Hindustan Unilever and Philips Consumer Electronics.
He is credited with consolidating PepsiCo’s India business with the ‘Power of One’ strategy and driving its snacks business back to double-digit growth.